10 reasons to embrace Windows 8 now

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The switch has been flipped, Windows 8 is now upon us. Manufacturers will soon fill the shelves of your local big box store with new computers of every shape, size, and orientation running Windows 8. The holiday season will no doubt be filled with incredible deals on machines to encourage you to make the upgrade to some new hardware. Of course, if you don’t need new hardware, Microsoft offers a Windows 8 upgrade tool on their website. With everything Microsoft is offering to encourage uptake, it’s pretty easy to see why you would want to embrace Windows 8 now. If you’re not convinced, here’s a few reasons why it’s worth considering.

Inexpensive, for now

Historically, Windows upgrades have been a little on the pricey side. If the next version didn’t offer some killer feature, chances are it wasn’t worth shelling out the cash for the update on the day it came out. Windows 8, however, is starting out at $39.99 for anyone running Windows 7. All you need to do is download the update tool from Microsoft, send them some money, and when your PC reboots it will be running Winodws 8 with all of your files still intact. The $39.99 price tag is something of an early adopter rate, in January the $70 price tag you see in stores will apply for the download version, too.

Free Media Center Pack

One of the increasingly common uses of Windows machines is to have a Home Theater PC setup. If you aren’t running something like XBMC, chances are you’re running Windows Media Center. If you want things like DVD and Blu-ray codecs, you need Media Center on your Windows 8 machine. In Windows 8, you’ll need to pay a little extra for the Media Center Pack, unless you go with the Pro version. If you don’t feel like the Pro version is necessary, but still would like to grab Media Center, the pack will be free until January. This offer is available to both digital and physical disk upgrade users.

SkyDrive Integration

With smartphones, tablets, and PCs connected all the time, it feels natural to want access to all of your files from all of these devices. With the centralized user experience Microsoft has been pushing out to their products, the easiest way to complete that experience would be to allow your documents and photos to exist seamlessly across the platform. Microsoft’s SkyDrive has been deeply integrated into both Windows Phone and Windows 8 to offer exactly this. You can store all of your documents, photos, even game save data to your SkyDrive and access the information from anything that can connect to Microsoft’s cloud storage service.

Centralized User Experience

Price and free things are always a good reason to upgrade if you are on the fence, but the truth is Microsoft is putting all of their eggs into this new basket. If you are a Windows 8, Windows Phone 8, or Xbox 360 user, you’re going to see the new user interface that Microsoft has implemented. Microsoft has made their user experience across all of their devices as seamless as possible. The tiled UI has been slowly making its way across Microsoft’s product line, finally ending with Windows 8. If you own multiple Microsoft products, the entire experience will look and feel the same.

Surface

Windows 8 is more than just a step forward for Microsoft software, it also marks the very first computer that has been built by the company. Surface was designed around Windows 8 to create a unique experience for the new OS. The $399 price point for a Surface RT is a steal for anyone looking for a new way to compute, and the soon to be released Surface Pro offers a no compromise solution for any user looking to get the best of both the PC and tablet worlds right now. The Surface hardware is incredibly high quality and a good first step into Windows 8, as well as the best way to enjoy the new OS the way Microsoft intended.

Performance

In theory, each version of Windows is going to offer a performance boost of some kind over the previous version of the OS. This isn’t always the case, as Windows Vista users can attest, but with Windows 8 the difference is all too clear. Everything from boot time to complex multitasking operations are noticeably faster on Windows 8. The OS breathes life into older machines, and the startup time on more recent machines alone is often reason enough to make the switch. Everything that has been tested so far has been much faster.

Windows 8 Exclusives

As is the case with any new OS, there will be Windows 8 software exclusives. Microsoft has accomplished this with the Windows Store, which serves as a destination for Windows 8 specific apps as well as interactive live tiles for the home screen. Especially if you have a touch enabled device, Windows 8 will grant you access to a significant number of apps that are exclusive to the platform.

If the apps aren’t exclusive, they are highly stylized to take advantage of the Windows 8 UI. The Netflix app for Windows 8 is a perfect example, and the design for this app is significantly improved over the UI used on iOS or Android. There are many apps that flow nicely and just plain look better on Windows 8 as a result of the new UI.

Backwards Compatibility

Windows 8 looks and feels very different from previous versions of Windows at first glance. Once you tap that Desktop tile, though, it’s like you never left Windows 7. The Desktop UI allows you to use all of your software from previous versions of Windows. On top of that, Microsoft has added compatibility modes to make sure the programs behave as close to their original design as intended.

This is only available on Windows 8 and Windows 8 Pro, however. Windows RT, being an ARM based version of the OS, isn’t quite as backwards compatible. Windows RT is limited to apps from the Microsoft Store, and that is unlikely to change anytime soon.

Security

For a number of reasons, Windows has a reputation for being the least secure of the PC operating systems. Many users run everything as Administrator, and the volume of users makes the platform a huge target for malicious software. Over the last few years, Microsoft has been developing tools like the User Account Control system to help prevent crippling OS damage. With Windows 8, security was clearly a priority.

Aside from UAC, Microsoft has included services like Windows Defender by default. This is the first version of Windows to come pre-installed with antivirus software, and Microsoft has developed their own tools instead of relying on a third party to protect the OS. Windows 8 is far from impenetrable, and you can install other services if you feel they would be more effective, but the platform as a whole will hopefully be much more secure moving forward.

Xbox Live and Smart Glass

Microsoft’s Xbox 360 console has grown significantly since its release. The gaming console almost doubles as a set top box now, offering streaming content and social interaction as well as access to massive digital content libraries. Windows 8 scoops up the best of these add-ons and makes them available on your PC with the same interface. Xbox Live social features, like chatting with friends or playing games against one another for achievements, are integrated into Windows 8 as well.

Then there’s Smart Glass, which allows you to control your Xbox 360 from your Windows 8 computer. You can push videos, music, and websites to the service as long as you and the Xbox are on the same network. Smart Glass is available on Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, so you can sync this content across the entire product line.

Final Thoughts

Windows 8 is well worth the upgrade, and there are some pretty great incentives for pulling the trigger sooner rather than later. As Microsoft moves forward with this new user experience, there will only be more reasons to upgrade, with the eventual goal of everyone moving to the new platform.

As we look back at the now 11 year old Windows XP, moving to the wildly different Windows 8 forces you to embrace a lot of changes all at one. Once you move in, however, you see that most of the changes are undeniably for the better.

Speak Your Mind

“Buy Windows 8 now because you will use Windows 8 sooner of later, we’ll make you either by pre-installing it on your new computer or crashing your old one with updates and when that happens, if you one of those people that made us work at making Windows better we’ll punish you for it by making you pay more. Not only that, but soon we’re charging extra for media features, so if you don’t blindly use Win8 now we’ll take that from you too.”

Um…Yeah…I’ll take my chances…Thanks.

Jack Heath

I hear you. LOL. I think my issue is the extra charge for the media edition and the eventual $70 price tag. MS love promotional pricing they up later. competition has done a lot to brin MS marketing into line and I think abandoning 3rd party products for a holistically Microsoft experience will put us back to the way things were.

asusfanboy562

I have to agree with the “nofate” person for one; but what i also think is that when micro soft was making win 8 they were not taking in the fact that there are lots of gamers out there, and my reason is that every game developer on the pc world is screwed-totally, because they are the ones that are busting the buts to update there games for you. ;) p.s. (it could be you spending months updating games)

asusfanboy562

I think when microsoft developers where making win 8 they where not keep in mind the fact that there are game developers out in the pc world that are going to have to work for weeks to update there games to win 8. That means gamers will have to wait for the updating of games and most likely re-download their games(most likely). :o :(

The RT variant is how Windows 9 will be built. And technologically advanced teenager, stop being so smug. I welcomed real change when I hesitantly installed Ubuntu on my desktop and for the first time, felt overwhelmed with fanboy emotions. Change for the sake of change, or in Microsoft’s case, change for the sake of copying what *nix has already done is pathetic. It’s almost as bad as the bunch of ignorant apple fanboys claiming that Steve Jobs was an inventor.

André Viana

Lol.
the task manager is better, the file transfer is better, the backgrounds! you can change them in multi-monitor mode! omg!
is it worth 40$?

André Viana

you know you could use your keyboard to open the start menu, and then write whatever you want and press enter right?
no mouseclicks involved
that remains exactly the same from windows 7 to windows 8
Oh and, linux has it too :S for free :S
sorry for that bro

André Viana

how much of you ACTUALLY bought it? :D

Alvaru

great for remote desktop.

I use an Acer W500 tablet at home, that was not designed for W8 and is very limited. However, I connect it to my desktop at my office and I get all the performance I need. Initially, W7 was on the desktop, and the user experience was mediocre. Now I have installed W8 in both computers, and the remote use is amazing!